The assignee of the present invention manufactures and deploys spacecraft for, inter alia, communications, broadcast services and/or imaging services. Many satellite services are provided from spacecraft in geosynchronous equatorial orbit (GEO), a circular, equatorial orbit having a radius of 42,164 kilometers and an orbital period of one sidereal day of (23 hr 56 min. 4 seconds, the period of rotation of Earth in inertial space). A satellite in GEO appears stationary to a ground station on the earth and can provide coverage to a significant portion of the globe at latitudes (the “GEO coverage latitudes”) between about 70° N and 70° S. Because longitudes (“slots”) at which spacecraft may be stationed in GEO (i.e., available locations on the GEO “arc”) are limited, it is desirable to find techniques for providing a service coverage region size similar to existing geostationary spacecraft by disposing spacecraft in moderately inclined, circular, geosynchronous orbits (i.e., an orbit having a radius of 42,164 kilometers and an inclination to the equator within the range of about 10° to about 20°).
The present applicant has developed improved techniques for deploying and operating a constellation of spacecraft arranged in moderately inclined orbits. For example, in a related patent application, filed concurrently herewith and entitled “Inclined Geosynchronous Orbit Spacecraft Constellations”, attorney docket number LORLP287, owned by the assignee of the present application, techniques are described for providing uninterrupted coverage to a substantial portion of GEO coverage latitudes from a moderately inclined geosynchronous orbit using a constellation consisting of as few as two spacecraft has been described. As a further example, in a related patent application, filed concurrently herewith and entitled “Orbital Storage and Deployment for Spacecraft in Inclined Geosynchronous Constellations”, attorney docket number LORLP298, owned by the assignee of the present application, techniques are described for providing spare on-orbit spacecraft capable of replacing any spacecraft in the constellation when called up. The disclosures of the above mentioned patent applications are hereby incorporated in their entirety into the present application for all purposes.